NEW YORK TIMES
The reporters interviewed voters in five states and asked them whether the debate changed their views on the presidential race.
So it was perhaps no accident that Vice President Kamala Harris’s first words during the presidential debate on Tuesday were, “I am actually the only person on this stage who has a plan.”
Some Americans might need more convincing.
Bob and Sharon Reed, both 77-year-old retired teachers who live on a farm in central Pennsylvania, had high hopes for the debate between Ms. Harris and former President Donald Trump. They thought that they would come away with a candidate to support in November.
But, Ms. Reed said, “It was all disappointing.”
The couple ended the night wondering how the costly programs each candidate supported — Mr. Trump’s tariffs and Ms. Harris’s aid to young families and small businesses — would help a couple like them, living on a fixed income that has not kept pace with inflation. They said they didn’t hear detailed answers on immigration or foreign policy, either.
Tuesday night was the first time any voter had seen Mr. Trump and Ms. Harris together. The two candidates had never met in person before, creating considerable trepidation among supporters of both campaigns about how they might perform.
Immediate reaction from political analysts favored Ms. Harris, whose attacks appeared to rattle Mr. Trump. She goaded him over the various criminal and civil charges against him. She said his former aides considered him “a disgrace” and that world leaders laugh at him. At one point, she asked whether he might be “confused” — a stinging line given Mr. Trump’s relentless mocking of President Biden’s mental acuity. And she questioned his emotional stability by saying he was not capable of processing his loss in 2020.
But not all voters, especially those undecided few who could sway the election, were effusive about the vice president’s performance.
In interviews, these undecided voters acknowledged that Ms. Harris seemed more presidential than Mr. Trump. And they said she laid out a sweeping vision to fix some of the country’s most stubborn problems.
But they also said she did not seem much different from Mr. Biden, and they wanted change.
And most of all, what they wanted to hear — and didn’t — was the fine print.
Voters said they were glad she has a tax and economic plan. But they want to know how it will become law when Washington is so polarized. They know she wants to give assistance to first-time home buyers, but doubted that it was realistic.
“She tried a couple times to say, ‘I want to do this and I want to do that,’ and that’s nice promises,” Ms. Reed said. “I hope she can get them through Congress.”
Going into the debate, Ms. Harris faced a challenge that Mr. Trump did not: Telling the country what they should expect from her presidency. With two-minute limits on the answers the candidates could give, that was always going to be difficult.
Americans are familiar with Mr. Trump — especially after four years in the White House and three-plus years of legal troubles since leaving Washington in disgrace and defeat.
A vast majority — 90 percent — of likely voters nationwide said they pretty much know all they need to about him, according to a New York Times/Siena College poll released this week before the debate.
And the debate seemed to contain few surprises for them.
Shavanaka Kelly, who lives in Milwaukee, said her three teenage daughters began laughing when Mr. Trump ranted about false social media rumors that migrants in Ohio are stealing and eating pets.
